


Through the Mirror

by thesometimeswarrior



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-28
Updated: 2015-04-28
Packaged: 2018-03-26 04:07:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3836440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesometimeswarrior/pseuds/thesometimeswarrior
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Sometimes, when he was alone, he talked to Tom Riddle in his head."</p><p>A character study of Albus Dumbledore.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through the Mirror

Sometimes, when he was alone, he talked to Tom Riddle in his head. _I knew a boy like you once,_ he’d say. _I loved a boy like you once._ And of course the variations between Riddle and Gellert were vast—the former ultimately did what he did because he was terrified, while Grindelwald was an idealist (though admittedly a twisted one)—but they were both Dark and they both terrified him. 

_I loved him,_ he’d say in his imaginary conversations. _And I helped him. Because I wanted him to love me. And I didn’t care who it hurt and who it killed, so long as it helped me get what I wanted. Perhaps I’m rather like you in that regard._

In that dark corner of his mind that he dare not acknowledge, he knew that he was more similar to Voldemort that Gellert ever was. Sometimes he would even look at himself in the mirror and, for a split second, think he’d see Riddle staring back at him. Perhaps that was why he was so infatuated with the Mirror of Erised: it did not show him the truth, but the most desperate desire of his heart.

He’d seen Grinderwald and what he became. All the people who died, all that blood on his hands—both of their hands—and he stopped him. He had to. And he swore, because he had waited far too long to stop Gellert—because he had helped him—that he would prevent others like him. He had to. 

When Riddle rose the first time, he became a strategist, used his mind to a lead a resistance, stop this before it got too far. But people still died. Good people—his former students, in fact. Innocents, blood spilled for being “unclean.” His Order, putting themselves in front of those innocents, dying for them. It was too much, even for his mind, even for his chess game. 

And then: a prophecy. Hope. One chosen to end it.

And then more death: James and Lily. Two of the best. 

Yet, there was still hope in the form of a child, the child who miraculously survived. The Chosen One. The Horcrux. Riddle had gone, but he’d return. He was tethered to life, and he feared death. He would return. 

Surely it was worth sacrificing one child on the alter to stop the bloodshed. Surely it was morally acceptable—it was for the Greater Good. For the real Greater Good, not Gellert’s. 

And he would make the boy happy. And he would make the boy good; he was a teacher, after all. And when the time came, he would make him a soldier for the Light. So when the time came, the boy himself would agree that he had to die, and would go willingly. 

Yet, sometimes, as the boy grew, he looked at him and saw another child sacrificed for the Greater Good. His dear Ariana. He couldn’t. Not again. Not even if he planned it this time. Not even if it was productive this time.

He tried to push this from his mind. There was nothing to be done. Besides, that was years away; Riddle had not found a way to return, and the boy was happy and loved.

Then one day a student—a good student, whom, as with all of his students, he had sworn to care for—was killed. Riddle returned. The boy was there. Riddle used him. 

“He took my blood, Professor. He said my blood would make him stronger than if he'd used someone else's. He said the protection my - my mother left in me - he'd have it too."

A flash of triumph, too quick for the boy to see—now was not the time. But when the boy was gone, he wept tears of joy. He would not have to sacrifice his morality on the alter to take down the dark. He could still be Good after all.

He looked in the mirror, and for the first time in a long while, despite the his return, did not think of Tom Riddle.

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a post I saw on tumblr (Found here: http://audible-smiles.tumblr.com/post/94742349682/why-is-it-always-dumbledore-is-my-fave-or) For some reason it just struck a chord. 
> 
> Also the one direct quote in this is lifted almost directly from "The Goblet of Fire."


End file.
